Star of Beauty and the Beast musical Rachael Beck leads youth creative arts workshop

During her visit to our little town of Bathurst, star of stage and screen, Rachael Beck led workshops in acting and singing to artistic youth.

Ms Beck is best known for her roles in popular sitcom Hey Dad, and for her appearances in musical theatre productions of Cats, Les Misérables and Beauty and the Beast.

Ms Beck ran these workshops on September 28, and September 29, at the Milltown building for the Carillon Junior Theatrical Society (CJTS), with the aim to share her knowledge from over 27 years in the industry.

"I'm a professional performer and educator, so I am passionate about the creative arts for our kids," she said.

For Ms Beck, the most important thing was being able to unlock the innate creative talent that lies within everybody.

"I think to be born human is to be born creative, so that's why I do a lot of work with creative arts in high schools and schools," she said.

"Creative arts gives you the soft skills you need in life; connection, teamwork, confidence, talking about emotions, why people say things, how people hold themselves physically - to feel the fear and do it anyway - these are all really, really important soft skills that people need for life."

In order to allow the youth attendees to develop these 'soft skills', Ms Beck ran a variety of different exercises for the children.

"We do warm-ups, teach them about singing techniques, acting techniques, we do scripts, we do solos, we do signing, we do group signing, we talk about confidence, we talk about auditions," she said.

One of the warm-ups that the children enjoyed was 'space jump', which calls for students to sporadically join an improvised scene, while continually changing the context of the scene based on the time in which they enter.

ALSO MAKING NEWS:

Not only was the workshop important for Ms Beck to pass on her knowledge to younger generations, it was also incredibly timely for several of the youth attendees.

Many student participants are also those who are involved in the CJTS performance of Beauty and the Beast, which will be presented later this year.

"I was the original Belle in Beauty and the Beast in Australia in the late 1990s, opposite Hugh Jackman, so it was perfect for me to come and give some of the cast members some special direction," Ms Beck said.

Youth attendee Sarah Lindsay will be playing the role of Belle in the CJTS performance of Beauty and the Beast, and to have direction from Australian theatre royalty was something that she found invaluable.

"I really value this experience. I want to be able to learn as much as I can from her because she's done it on the big stage, she knows the character, she knows the songs and she's an amazing actor, so I want to get a lot out of this because I want to be a good Belle," Sarah said.

The workshops allowed Sarah to perform for Ms Beck, and to garner her thoughts on her characterisation of Belle.

"I've gotten feedback on how to portray my character better and how to have more stage presence and emotion on stage," Sarah said.

"I feel like it will help me know more of what the audience wants to see from Belle, and even how to make me feel more like Belle so that when I'm on stage I can act more like her."

Creator and director of CJTS' production of Beauty and the Beast, Bronwyn Colley, organised the workshops, and thought it was just "brilliant" when she made the connection that Ms Beck was Australia's original Belle.

"It's lovely to have someone who is an industry professional here, and she's so wonderful with the kids ... so passionate, she's really relaxed and down to earth and really relatable," Ms Colley said.

"It's so lovely to have someone come in and give them a fresh boost, and someone who has played the role as well and knows the songs inside out; it's just perfect timing.

"She's had a sing along with one of our Belles ... and it's just wonderful," she said.

CJTS performances of Beauty and the Beast will take place from November 3, to November 6 at the Bathurst Memorial Entertainment Centre.

Ms Beck also held a creative workshop for adults, which allowed older people to be able to explore their passion in an amateur way.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can access our trusted content: